Hydrogeological assessment of groundwater resources within Isuikwuato and environ South Eastern Nigeria: Agenda for food agriculture and clean water policies

Groundwater resources of the Isuikwuato area, south eastern Nigeria, have been evaluated using integrated geophysical and hydrogeochemical techniques, to determine the quality and usability of the groundwater for domestic and agricultural purposes. Twenty Vertical Electrical Soundings (VES) physicochemical analyses were done. Depth to aquiferous unit varies from 38 to 148 m. The hydrogeochemical characterization shows that anion area, 85% of the total water sample in the area is Cl- dominant, whereas 10% are HCO3- dominant and 5% of the sample had mixed dominant ionic specie. In the cation area, 75% of the total water samples had Ca2+ as their dominant ionic specie, while 25% of the samples had mixed dominant ionic specie. According to the Piper diagram, the region is in the geochemical zone 1 (Alkalines earth exceeds Akalines). The Durov plot demonstrates that there is ionic exchange occurring within the groundwater zone with a hydrogeochemical evolution trend of Cl-> HCO3-+CO32-> Ca2+>Na++K+> SO42-> Mg2+. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) values indicated loadings were present for 37.42% of the parameters (PP) in PP1, 65.60% of the parameters in PP2 and in PP3, it had 75.23 loadings. The water is suitable for agriculture giving the value of calculated Sodium Adsorption Ratio (SAR) that ranges from 0.20 – 0.56. This study recommends that the government should leverage this to availability of clean water and food to the people to enable it to achieve its sustainable development goals (SDGs).   Key words: Groundwater, hydrogeochemistry, geophysical, aquiferous zone, Isuikwuato.